“Shut up!” Cherry hissed. “You don’t talk about couriers out here! That’s like asking to get your throat slit in the night!”
“Then you’re not involved?” said Laura, flabbergasted. “But—but you were glaring at us the whole time we were in the trolleys!”
“I was trying to pin you down!” Cherry protested, visibly flustered. “I didn’t know who you were, I didn’t know how you interact with other people! I don’t know if you’ve got a bias against people like me!”
“You do take a little too long warming up to people,” said Grim, still facedown on the brick.
Cherry swatted him. “I don’t want to hear that from you!”
“But this doesn’t make any sense,” said Laura. “Why did you take us out here, if you’re not leading us into a plot?”
“We needed Sweepers,” said Cherry. “On our last headhunting job, Grim and I found a nasty infestation out here. The wilds is full of monsters, but this one was getting too close to travel routes. Amicae’s the closest city, so we tried appealing to your ERA offices to get their rail Sweepers on the job. They told me they were on a tight schedule and it wasn’t close enough to the tracks for them to care. I thought the city’s head Sweeper would be able to point me in the right direction, maybe even arrange for Ranger-Sweeps from other cities to come help.”
Laura cradled her head in her hands. “And you got Juliana instead.”
“She said you were the Sweepers for the job!” said Cherry, exasperated. “I mean, you don’t look like much, but you didn’t even protest.”
“She sort of had us at gunpoint,” said Okane.
“She what?” said Cherry.
“Let’s start over,” Laura sighed. “I’m Laura, this is Okane, we’re city Sweepers and I, for one, have never been outside Amicae beyond a train ride to Puer. We are … regretfully involved with some kind of departmental split, and it seems ready to rack up a body count. Juliana worked you into this so fast and easy, and I thought Rangers were involved. I’m sorry for jumping to conclusions.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Cherry waved it off, but she hadn’t entirely settled. “Getting thrown at a couple of strangers would be nerve-racking on the best of days, and it sounds like you’ve got good reason to suspect people. I thought you were just naturally cagey. I should’ve noticed something was up.”
Grim finally raised his head. “Why would you be forced into the wilds? How does that factor into this split?”
“It’s probably so Juliana can carry on with her plans,” Laura grumbled. “She’d just discovered we knew about a plan. We don’t know all the details, but just knowing was enough for her. She wanted us out of the way.”
“Presumably she thinks we’ll die out here in the wilds,” said Okane.
Cherry recoiled in disgust. “What, she thought I couldn’t protect you?”
“I think she just didn’t believe we had enough skill,” said Okane. “It doesn’t matter how good our guide is, if our equipment is bad and we don’t know how to handle such a strong infestation.”
“Is your equipment bad?” said Cherry.
“No,” said Laura. “It’s a long story.”
“Well, count your lucky stars that your boss didn’t do her research.” Cherry drew herself to full height and thumped a fist to her chest. “Grim and I are some of the best Rangers this side of Terual. Headhunting, reconnaissance, raids, we’ve done it all. There’s no one better to serve as an escort. If anyone tries messing with you before you reach that infestation, we’ll blow them to bits.”
“Thank you.” A giggle escaped Laura’s throat, and she buried her face in her hands. “That’s a load off my mind. I didn’t realize how much that weighed on me until just now.”
“I do have a question, before we change the subject,” said Okane. “- - - mentioned that - - - knew about couriers.”
“We’re not discussing them,” said Grim.
Cherry nodded. “It’s like you said about your boss and that plan: just knowing about them is enough to get you killed. They don’t like being seen. Don’t like being known. If you stumble on one of their hideouts and they find out about it, they’ll hunt you down. We’ve known other Rangers that died that way.”
“They died painfully,” Grim agreed. “Couriers want to know who you’ve talked to. They’ll torture information out of you, then go and hunt down any other whisper of their existence.”
“A small satellite town near Dea got completely wiped out by them,” said Cherry. “The city blamed it on felin, but any Ranger knows the difference between a bite and a sword injury.”
“But who are they?” said Laura. “Why are they so secretive?”
“Our current mission is keeping you alive,” said Cherry. “Talking to you any more about them would be the opposite.”
“Just one more point.” Okane wove his fingers together tightly. “Just as confirmation. Couriers come from the south, don’t they? They come from Zyra.”
The Rangers looked at each other again. Their expressions clearly read yes, but Grim only said, “Who can tell?”
13
FLY FLEETLY
The next day they set out early. The horses trekked along a mountain path surrounded by thick copses of mixed trees and brush, a weaving route that took them deeper and deeper into the forest. Animals darted out of sight at their approach, but birdsong rang from the trees. A monkeyish creature with long blunt claws eyed their progress from its own tree limb before launching itself into the air, to glide along their path on flaps of skin like wings. The forest trek took the majority of the day before they reached the rockier slopes of the mountains. Their route hugged the slopes, becoming a thin uphill ridge. On this path they circled Mount Amicum and eventually broke away, descending once more toward the flatter lands separating the mountains from Terrae.
“We’ll take the lowland route to reach our checkpoint,” Cherry explained as the horses picked their way down, close to tumbling head over heels on the slope. “From here there aren’t a lot of real paths. The road to Terrae goes out of our way. We’re heading more towards Thrax and those roads are long out of use. We’ll be more exposed, and there are a lot of dangerous animals out there. Felin don’t do well in tight places and uneven ground. That’s one of the reasons trains are so vulnerable to them—they’re on the flattest part of the wilds, right where felin want to be. On the plus side, it’s faster and physically less dangerous.”
“So,” Laura said, forcing bravado and turning to Okane, “looking forward to seeing some big ugly predators?”
He smiled, more a grimace than anything. “I admit, I do wonder what a felin looks like.”
Laura shuddered. She’d run into one on the train to Puer, and had no desire to repeat that experience.
Come nightfall they remained in the foothills, scouting around for a place to camp for the night. Nocturnal animals stirred, blinking from the darkness with enormous eyes that reflected light the same way Theron’s had. Chattering rose, branches creaked, and feet pattered, but even below this subdued din Laura thought she heard something else. Something that didn’t belong. She told herself it was just the darkness making her jumpy and forced herself to stay calm.
“Are we staying in another rest house?” she asked.
“No,” Cherry replied, curt and hushed, and Laura felt chided.
“Then what are we doing?” she tried again, barely audible over the creaking saddles.
“Rest houses are in the vicinity of cities and satellite towns,” Grim explained. “We’re beyond those now. There won’t be a roof over our heads for a while.”
Cherry stopped, raising a hand to catch everyone’s attention. She gestured silently ahead and to the left, where Laura glimpsed light. A campfire?
Grim skirted the Sweepers, stopping by the flanks of Cherry’s black horse. “What do you think?”
Cherry glanced back, taking stock of their caravan. “I’m going to investigate.”
Grim’s brow furrowed.
“Alone?”
“No. We might need a show of force. Sweepers, you stay here with the packhorses. I don’t want to risk you two being in the middle of a shoot-out. We’ll circle back for you once we know what’s going on.”
Grim gathered the two packhorses and brought them to Laura.
“Stay off the path for now,” he instructed. “Once we’re clear, I’ll come back for you.”
The Rangers moved away. The horses left behind made as if to follow, and Laura jerked back on the reins to stop them. Her horse tossed its head angrily, but after two more attempts it gave up. She couldn’t convince it to move off the path, though.
“Come on,” she growled, pulling on the reins and tapping its sides with her heels.
“Let’s just lead them,” said Okane, swinging out of the saddle. After some hesitation Laura did the same, and they led the horses off the path. Once they were far enough away to deem themselves safe, they tied the reins to some lower branches and sat down to wait. They were downhill, so couldn’t see the light anymore, but perched on a large rock and looked in that direction anyway.
“How long do - - - think they’ll take?” Okane asked, resting his chin on his knees.
“Not long, I hope. I don’t like being out here without them.” A chilly breeze went by, and Laura shuddered. “The wilds are both mundane and scarier than I thought.”
“Agreed.” Okane looked around, as if checking for any eavesdroppers.
“Are you expecting a courier to come sneaking up behind us?” Laura said dryly.
“Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised.”
Laura sighed. “You’re going to tell me what all of this means, right? Sometime soon?”
“Yes, but the Rangers were right. This is their territory. It’s better to explain in a safe place.”
“And yet, you didn’t do that before.”
“I didn’t think we’d be uprooted that easily.”
“Well, there’s no getting around it now. Whether you acknowledge them or not, they’re part of this mess and we won’t escape it anytime soon. Especially not if we don’t know what’s going on.”
“I know,” he whispered.
A sharp crack rent the air. A flock of birds took flight from a nearby tree, shrill and frightened, while the other sounds of nature came to a stuttering stop. The horses snorted and stamped, tugging at their tethers. More noise followed, pops and crashes and echoes that Laura registered immediately as gunfire.
“Oh, shit,” she whispered.
Okane leapt up and grabbed the closest horse by the bridle, trying to calm it, but its eyes continued to roll. The guns kept going, and now that Laura listened she heard shouting too. She stood, shaking, as Okane’s horse tossed its head and whinnied. A loud snap made her whirl around. A man had crept down from the path, a small object held in each hand. For a moment she thought Grim had come to take them out of the danger zone, but this man wasn’t near pale enough. Worse, he brandished a pistol and a knife. Realizing his cover was blown, he raised the gun.
“Get down!” Laura yelled, launching herself at Okane. She knocked him out of the way, right before a bullet zipped past. It clipped the horse’s harness and sent the animal into a frenzy. They scrambled away from its hooves and bumped into the next packhorse.
“Who’s there?” Okane yelped.
“Get back out here where I can see you!” the man roared. “If you want to live, you’ll do as I say! I’ve got a gang surrounding you!”
“That’s a bluff,” Okane hissed through his teeth, eyes flicking about. They rested on Laura for a moment, and she got the idea.
“Let’s go,” she agreed, and without any further ado, they bolted.
The man shouted in rage as they thundered away downhill.
Despite the amount of people dashing through forests in films, Laura found it difficult to keep a good pace. Undergrowth knocked into her legs, making her stumble and lose speed. She had to skirt trees and scramble over fallen trunks. Only patches of moonlight shone through the branches. She felt blind, but doggedly followed the crashing noises of Okane’s flight. The man stampeded after them, but visibility wasn’t much better for him. The few times his pistol fired, the shots veered far off course and smashed into trees or foliage. The hill grew steeper, then evened out into a valley. This made the going slightly easier, but Laura still breathed harsh, and she knew her clothes had ripped. She sighted Okane ahead of her, a flash of brown vaulting over a small ditch to the left, but otherwise relied on sound.
They bumped into each other what felt like an eternity later, as both swerved to avoid outcroppings of rock. They almost collided before realizing the other was there, and it took another horrified moment before they realized that no, they hadn’t just run into their pursuer. They stumbled on, and barely ten paces after this they found another yawning hole in the ground with a circle of dirt around the edge.
“Hang on,” Laura panted, grabbing Okane by the sleeve. “Careful here.”
“What?”
“Circle around it and lie down in the bushes. I’ll be right there.”
Baffled, he darted past a few more trees and wriggled under one of the larger bushes. Laura approached the knuckerhole, heart hammering. Hoping desperately that there wasn’t an animal down there, she kicked at the dirt circle and went so far as to slide her way in. She slipped onto her rear in the process and caught a glimpse of pitch-black tunnel before activating her amulets and getting the hell out. She could hear the man approaching and made a frantic bid for the underbrush. She dove into the vegetation much closer than Okane had, and not a moment too soon. The man blundered around the rock outcropping and paused. The moon shone just bright enough for him to see the disturbed rim of the knuckerhole.
Go for it, Laura thought, gritting her teeth. Look at that, not at us.
The man crept forward, weapons held in shaky hands as he approached the hole. He circled it, squinting down. To Laura’s relief, his shaking subsided and he began to laugh.
“So that’s where you went!” he guffawed. “You’re a damn fool! Come here, you hito-loving scum! Can’t hide down there forever!”
Laura let out a sigh of relief, pressing her head against the dirt. The ground was hard and cold, but her run had left her uncomfortably warm, so she welcomed the coolness as protection and luxury. Meanwhile the man had one foot on the edge of the hole. She turned her head to watch as he kept yelling.
“Boy, get out here with your hands up! No funny business if you know what’s good for your little girlfriend. Don’t worry about her, I’ll take good care of—”
The words stopped abruptly. He barely had time to stiffen before something shot out of the hole. Laura saw rusty scales, bulbous wide eyes, and a heavily crested head on a serpentine neck, before teeth clamped down on the man’s side and he was dragged into the knuckerhole. Only a lingering shriek and dropped knife remained. It happened in a split second, and suddenly Laura felt tense again, more frightened than she’d been before. The ground no longer seemed safe. Something tapped her hand, and she jumped. It was only Okane. He looked at her with wide eyes and moved his head, motioning for her to go. They shuffled along the ground for a few feet, and once out of the knuckerhole’s range, leapt to their feet and fled.
They wandered through the woods for a long time. After every hill rose another, and they hadn’t paid attention to landmarks so had no idea which direction they’d come from or where their guides were or if they were alive. The nightlife of the wilds returned to its earlier volume. While it sounded creepy, the smaller animals and herbivores making the noises wouldn’t sing if there were predators around. Okane relaxed too, taking more time to observe their surroundings.
As they crossed a small clearing, Laura slowed and pulled out her pocket watch. She squinted to make out the numerals.
“It’s past one in the morning,” she groaned. “How long do you think we’ve been running?”
“Hours. I don’t know, I didn’t check.”
“
What do you think we should do now?” The idea of wandering more didn’t appeal much. She was dead on her feet and cold. She rubbed at her arms, wishing for the horses and supplies.
Okane cast around. “We should find some kind of shelter for the night and sleep. We can keep going tomorrow.”
“What kind of shelter? Grim said there wasn’t anywhere with a roof for a long ways.”
“Well,” he grunted, hopping over a particularly large root as they left the moonlit clearing behind them, “Brecht’s actually fascinated with the wilds. Back at Underyear, during the fireworks, he talked about some of the tamer animals and their habits. I think we just need to find a burrow we can fit in.”
“Are we talking about abandoned knuckerholes? Because I’m pretty sure that man thought it was abandoned. Look where it got him.”
Okane shuddered. “Not a knuckerhole. No way are we getting near one of those. Let’s just keep our eyes open for something.”
They kept walking. Twenty minutes later Okane ducked down, peered through the trees, then made a beeline for something.
“Did you find one?” Laura blinked furiously to keep her vision clear as she followed him to a dense thicket.
He appraised the outside, wandering first left, then right, before nodding. “I think this will do.”
“It’s not occupied, is it?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Smell. I don’t remember what’s supposed to be in this kind of den, but I remember it’s supposed to be pretty pungent.”
“You realize humans aren’t renowned for our sense of smell.”
Okane shrugged and knelt down. He inspected the thick grasses a moment more before flattening himself to the ground and crawling in. It turned out there was a small tunnel, not tall enough to fit in easily. Laura sat outside and watched Okane’s boots vanish into the gloom. Abruptly there came a thump, and a wheeze of pain.
“Okane?” Laura peered into the tunnel, heart in her throat. “Okane, are you okay?”
“Fine,” he grunted. “Hang on.”
She heard shuffling. She couldn’t see anything in the pitch-darkness of the tunnel but squinted anyway. Surely knuckers didn’t live in thickets?
The Monstrous Citadel Page 20